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Hello and thanks for visiting my blog. I have been knitting on and off for 50 years and I recently learned to crochet. I love looking for wool bargains and making them into something useful. I mainly knit for charity. I occasionally knit for myself and family members if I find a really good pattern or if they ask nicely!!

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Wednesday, 29 October 2014

This is what I am knitting at the moment. It is a top-down jumper for a 3 year old child. I chose this pattern because it is seamless which I think is important in a thick jumper. I am actually combining 2 yarns:

Pure Gold 4 ply yarn in light blue

Borgs S.N.2 garn in light brown

The light blue yarn was part of a bargain joblot and the light brown yarn was kindly donated to me by Joanne of the Cup On The Bus blog. I checked the Borgs yarn on Ravelry and discovered that it is 5 ply which I am not used to knitting with. There is also a very limited range of patterns for 5 ply yarns. So, by combining it with the light blue, I have been able to select from a wider range of patterns.

I can't recommend the pattern yet. I have just finished the raglan increases and have started on the main body. So far, I have discovered 2 minor errors and 1 major error in the pattern. This is a free pattern that has been translated into English from another language. It is very good of the author to give away her pattern on Ravelry and she must be unaware of the errors. For example, according to the pattern, if I have 220 stitches and place 48 x 2 onto holders for the sleeves I should be left with 200 stitches for the main body. I don't think so!!! I am actually left with 124 stitches and these seem to be enough for a roomy jumper.

I took a look at the French and Spanish versions of the pattern and can see that the sentence that is incorrect in the English version does not appear in those versions. So I have left a comment about the major error on the pattern page. If it is corrected by the time I finish the jumper, I will definitely recommend it. Meanwhile, the fact that only 9 knitters have completed this pattern is probably explained by the errors. That is a pity as it is otherwise a simple pattern.

Saturday, 25 October 2014

I hadn't intended to post this blanket, scarf and hat collection until I had more items ready. But I was browsing through the Loving Hands website this morning and discovered that Operation Orphan has a delivery planned to go to Syria soon. They also deliver blankets and clothing to children in other countries, so I am fairly confident that these items will reach someone who needs them. Posting items to war zones and other far off places is a bit of a "fingers crossed" exercise. But the least I can do is to try to help.

I have very limited space for storing finished items. This is partly deliberate as I believe that my items do nobody any good until I post them off. I had just the right size box and it would have been silly to waste it! There is now a big empty space waiting for me to fill with more items and someone will be a bit more warm and comfortable. Win win.

Friday, 17 October 2014

Here's my latest knitted hat. I used lovely red yarn that I bought cheaply in a summer bootfair. I love the coloured speckles in it. I made this slightly bigger than the last 3 hats because heads come in all shapes and sizes.

This hat was inspired by the Awesome Hat pattern. But I swapped to stocking stitch after the ribbed brim as I think it shows off the yarn better.

My obsession with neat hat crowns continues. So here is the crown:

I love it!

This has to be a short blog post. The 3 girls for whom I knitted the little fingerless gloves are arriving tomorrow. I will finally find out if they fit them!

Saturday, 11 October 2014

I'm delighted to say that I have just finished my big crochet blanket. It measures 40" x 57" and is destined for Operation Orphan which is an organisation that distributes clothing and blankets to children in need around the world.

I'm really pleased with how this turned out. As it will be going to a cold country, I chose real wool Aran yarns. I can't imagine this blanket will ever be thrown into a washing machine. So the chances of it being ruined are minimal. The teal yarn came from a lucky charity shop find. The rest of the yarn was donated to me by Joanne of the Cup On The Bus blog. Thanks again, Joanne. I still have enough of your yarn to make another blanket or lots of hats and scarves.

I used the wonderful free Random Stripe Generator to plan the stripes. This is worth considering if you make a lot of stripy things. You simply input your colours and number of required rows and it throws up lots of different suggestions.

I didn't follow any particular pattern. I used a 5mm hook and crocheted 160 rows of 125 half trebles (UK).

CONFESSION TIME: I ended the blanket with 2 fewer stitches than I started with . I have absolutely no idea how this happened, especially as I was very careful. It doesn't show over such a big blanket. But one of my aims in life now is to complete one of these blankets without losing or gaining any stitches.

Wednesday, 8 October 2014

Here is another hat that I have just knitted from the Awesome Hat pattern. I forgot to mention last time that, apart from the neat decreases, another feature is that the ribbing lines up when the brim is folded. So the knit and purl rows continue along the hat instead of switching places at the fold line. That is just a minor detail, but I like it.

This is how the neat decreases look in ribbing:

I'm really glad I bought this glass head model as it shows off the hat perfectly. I feel one more of these hats in my near future. Then I might move on to other projects.....

Friday, 3 October 2014

I've been knitting these little hats for the Innocent Smoothie Age UK appeal. They eventually end up on bottles of smoothies in supermarkets and a 25p donation goes to Age UK for every bottle sold. There is more information about the appeal here. The deadline isn't until November 14th. But I decided that I wouldn't have time to knit any more of these. So they are going in the post now.

Apologies for the poor photo. My new computer needs to go to the repair shop to sort out the glass of water that I accidentally spilled over it. Hey ho! I am back on my old computer which doesn't have such a good photo editing function. I am surprisingly calm about wrecking a good computer. I had already been cutting down on my computer time and my old computer might turn out to be all I need. Time will tell!